World After Death/Issue 30
James watched in shock as the biters continued to hungrily dine on Ernie's corpse. Tears began to burn his eyes, the first time he had cried since Chris died. Cicero stood behind him, still watching in disbelief. "Marshall...what did you..." James cleared his throat. "It had to be done. He was a burden on us all. It-it had to be done." "Fair enough, just...Jesus." James stoop to his feet and wiped his face of the tears. "Let's get home. I want to have a quick chat with our prisoners." ---- Shelby approched Jorge he was facing the tree line, arms crossed as if he was waiting for something. "Uh, Jorge?" Shelby asked. "Huh? Oh, what is it, Shelby?" "Rachel's awake, she's asking where Vince is...I don't know what to tell her." Jorge sighed. "Stay here I'll tell her." "You sure?" "It's my fault we lost him, should be." "Alright." Jorge approched the home where Rachel was being kept, Michael walked out the front door tightening a fresh bandage around his arm, where he had been shot. "Going to tell Rachel the bad news i suppose?" "Yeah. I don't know how she'll take it." "It won't be good." "Yeah...anyway better get to it." "Good luck." Jorge walked inside and saw Rachel sitting on the sofa she was drinking a bottle of water and had some gauze wrapped around her head. "Hey, Rachel." "Hey, Jorge." "How's your head doing?" "It feels better still kind of hurts though." "It should feel fine tomorrow." There was an awkward silence between the two before Rachel spoke again. "Where's my dad? Shelby said he was on a run..." Jorge sighed. "He's...not on a run. We had to leave him behind at the school." Rachel dropped her water and looked down. "So he's dead," she said through her already flowing tears. "We don't know that, he's probably fine...he." "Stop with the bullshit! Those people are crazy, they killed him and you know it. Just stop lying to me!" Jorge was shocked by the outburst from the normally quiet child, he tried to speak. "Rachel...I..." Rachel shook her head, still sobbing. "Just leave me alone." Jorge hung his head and left the house, he had just now noticed how tired he was, he felt as though he was about to pass out, he headed for one of the empty homes when he was stopped by Mike. "How did it go with Rachel?" Mike asked. "Not well, pretty sure she's pissed at me, can't blame her." "She'll come around." "I don't know. I just need to get some sleep. Mind watching over things for me?" "Actually that's gonna have to wait, we have a few things to talk about." Jorge sighed. "What is it?" "These people are broken, Jorge." "I am aware of that." "You sure? Because you seem pretty confident in taking a battle to that high school. Fact is I don't think we can." "We can and we will. We can't leave our people with those maniacs." "I don't want to, but getting ourselves killed won't help them. At the moment you and Aaron are the only formidable fighters we have, there's no way we can take on Evergreen." "I'm sure Caitlin, Shelby, Emily and the others will all do fine." "Not saying they won't, but you can't just ask them to kill other people, that's a big thing. Some of them may not have it in them." "Well we don't have a choice, Michael! They're gonna have to get over it." "Listen to yourself, Jorge. You act like you don't even care about these people." Jorge got in Mike's face, his fists clenched. "What the hell is that supposed to mean? My best friend is in that place. God knows what they're doing to him! I care about every single one of them and you imply I don't?! You got a lot of nerve, Michael!" Mike put a hand on Jorge's chest. "Ease back, son." "Or what?" "Can you two stop?" Emily asked as she approched the two. "We have a enough things to worry about, last thing we need is you guys fighting all the time." "I'm sorry Emily, but we have to talk about these things. I want to get them out of there too, but we can't do it unprepared." Mike said. Jorge sighed. "Look I'm sorry. I'm just tired, can we talk about this in the morning, Michael?" "Alright, alright. Fine." "Thank you." Jorge went inside the home and shut the door behind him. "Sorry about all that, Emily." Mike said. "It's okay...I just hate fighting, and yelling. Aaron and my dad used to do it all the time always going back and fourth about school and jobs and all that shit." "We'll try to avoid the yelling tomorrow," Mike said with a smile. "Thanks," Emily said returning the smile. ---- James Marshall busted through the door along with a few of his men to greet his prisoners. "Hello all, figured I'd stop by one last time for the night." "Thought you had shit to do?" Trevor asked, with his arms crossed across his chest and a harsh glare in his remaining eye. "It can wait a few more minutes, just wanted to check up on things. Anyone ready to talk?" No one responded to his question, simply staring at him. James shook his head with a slight chuckle, he pulled out a pair of brass knuckles from his coat pocket and slipped them on his right hand, then the other on his left. "Guess I gotta do shit myself if I want it done." "What exactly is your deal?" Matthew asked. "Excuse me?" "You act like you're tough shit, but all you are is an angry little man who got power and that's all you'll-" James punched Matthew in the stomach, he fell to the ground. Sonny grabbed Robert and forced him to the ground, keeping him pinned. Larry backed Trevor into a corner, keeping an AK trained on him. Richard reluctantly held a revolver to Vince's head and finally Cicero grabbed Lindsey, holding her close wrapping his arm around her neck and pressing a pistol to her back. "No sudden moves, lass. Last thing I want to do is hurt your fine ass." Lindsey gave a sarcastic laugh. "Wish my aim was better. I could have shot that dumb grin off your stupid fucking face." "Ha, I love it when they fight back!" Cicero said, exciting a chuckle from Sonny. Richard rolled his eyes in disgust. James grabbed Matthew by his collar and lifted him to his feet. "What give you the fucking right to talk down to me you blind motherfucker?!" Matthew glared at James. "All you are is a little kid trying to play god, go ahead kill me, show these people the monster underneath!" James roared with rage and threw Matthew to the ground, he began kicking him in the gut. "Hey!" Vince yelled. James stopped his assault and slowly turned to Vince and gave him a questioning look. "Leave him alone." Vince said sternly. "Or what?" "I see what you're trying to here, Marshall." Marshall stepped closer until he was face to face with Vince. "And what's that?" "You want to be like you're brother is that it?" James gritted his teeth as if the mere mention of his brother caused him psychical pain. "Don't you fucking talk about him." "You're brother was a hero to you and you're people. But you know what he really was?" James clenched his fists. "Shut your goddamn mouth." "He was nothing but a sick, twisted, coward, just like you." " Shut up! " James threw a punch it connected to Vince's left eye, Vince fell. James grabbed him and delivered another punch to the same spot, and another and another. Robert tried to shake from Sonny's hold, but the large man's weight was too much for him to even move. Trevor and Matthew simply watched in fear. Lindsey closed her eyes as burning tears rolled down her cheeks. "Please, please make him stop. He has a daughter, you can't let him do this!" She pleaded with Cicero. "Nothing I can do." A voice came through on Cicero's talkie, he answered it. James Marshall continued his assault, each punch made the area around Vince's eye swell more and more, at this point he couldn't even feel the pain and was beginning to pass out. Richard couldn't watch any longer, he grabbed Marshall and pulled him away from Vince. "He's had enough, goddammit!" Richard yelled. James pushed him away. I decide when he's had enough, not you!" "Boss!" Cicero interrupted. "What is it?" James said with annoyance. "That was David, said something happened to Mr. Harter, took a bad fall got banged up pretty bad, figured you should know." Just then James remembered his planned dinner with the Harter's. "Alright, get all these people sorted and get one of the other medics to take a look at his eye. I gotta go check up on Andrew." James headed for the door, his men stood frozen shocked by James' sudden change of mood. James looked back. "That's an order!" Cicero let go of Lindsey and she rushed to Vince's side. "Sonny, Larry you two stick around here. Richard go get a medic up here." Richard snorted and left the room, Cicero followed. Sonny and Larry both left and locked the door behind them. Trevor sat down in one of the desks and laid his head down. Matthew remained on the floor too shocked to move. Lindsey held Vince's head in her hands. "Vince can you hear me, are you there? Please say something." Robert kneel'ed down next to her. "He's out, hon." Lindsey began to cry Robert pulled her into his embrace. "That fucking animal." "Shh...we won't let him get away with this. I'll kill every last one of them." ---- Susan heard a light knock on her door, she quickly answered it and saw it was Richard, he had a look of worry on his face. "Hey Rich, something wrong?" "Just listen really carefully to me, Susan. Get all that you can packed, tomorrow we are out of here." "What happened?" "Marshall happened. I was willing to give him a chance, Susan, but he's becoming his brother and it's looking even worse." "Oh my god. Did he kill someone?" "He would have if I hadn't stopped it." "Jesus...you were right. I'll have my things ready." "Good...we're out of here at the crack of dawn. Might even orchestrate a little break out while we're at it." ---- Shelby had been in and out of sleep on her whole watch, she awoke to a hand tapping her shoulder, she gasped and looked up to see Aaron. "Sorry didn't mean to spook ya," he said with an awkward laugh. "Oh, no it's okay, I just haven't had a lot of sleep." "Thinking about Trevor?" Shelby looked at the ground. "Yeah..." "I'm worried about all of them. I can't stop thinking about what's going on with them right now." Shelby wanted to cry, but she held it back. "We'll get them back, Aaron." "Damn right we will...I never realized how much of a selfish ass I was being." "You're not-" "There was a time where I would have let any one of you die, to protect my sister. And when Steven gave his life for me, that just opened my eyes. It can't just be about me and her anymore, it's all of now. We're a...family." Shelby just smiled and nodded. "Trevor would be proud to hear that. Y'know, he always told me he saw something in you, he wasn't sure what, but it was something great." Aaron frowned. "He was always looking out for me and I never-" Aaron began to tear up. Shelby stood and hugged him. "You have to stay strong, Aaron. Trevor would want you to, just have faith he's okay. I'm sure he is, okay?" Aaron cleared his throat. "Yeah, you're right. Listen, just go get some sleep I'll finish up your watch." "You sure?" "Yeah, go on." Shelby left heading for the closest home. Aaron sat down and started into the dark, motionless trees. "Hang in there guys, we're coming for you," he said to himself. To Be Continued... Credits *Vince Garcia *Rachel Garcia *Lindsey Wallace *Robert Jones *Trevor *Shelby *Michael Hood *Aaron *Emily *Jorge *Matthew *James Marshall *Cicero *Richard *Susan *Larry *Sonny Deaths *None Trivia Previous Issue: Issue 29 Next Issue: Issue 31 Category:World After Death Category:World After Death Issues Category:Issues Category:Ghost